As Moscow’s bombardment of Ukrainian infrastructure continued on Thursday, Putin delivered a broadside against Washington and its allies, which he accused of inciting the conflict in Ukraine.

Putin told the Valdai Discussion Club the West was playing what he cast as a “dangerous, bloody and dirty” geopolitical game that was sowing chaos across the world.

Ultimately, Putin said, the West would have to talk to Russia and other major powers about the future of the world.

“The historical period of the West’s undivided dominance over world affairs is coming to an end,” Putin said.

“We are standing at a historical frontier: Ahead is probably the most dangerous, unpredictable and, at the same time, important decade since the end of World War Two.”

Russia did not consider the West to be an enemy of Russia despite the current phase of confrontation, he added.

Russia sent troops into Ukraine on February 24, triggering the biggest confrontation with the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis in the depths of the Cold War when the Soviet Union and the United States came closest to nuclear war.

Tens of thousands of people have been killed while the West has imposed the most severe sanctions in history on Russia, one of the world’s biggest suppliers of natural resources.

Asked about a potential nuclear escalation, Putin said the danger of nuclear weapons usage would exist as long as nuclear weapons existed.

Also on Thursday, a senior Russian government official raised the possibility that Moscow could shoot down commercial Western satellites being used to help Ukraine’s war effort.

There was no immediate reaction from the United States or commercial satellite providers.

Konstantin Vorontsov, a senior Russian foreign ministry official, said the use of Western satellites to aid the Ukrainian war effort was “an extremely dangerous trend”.

“Quasi-civilian infrastructure may be a legitimate target for a retaliatory strike,” he told the United Nations First Committee, adding that the West’s use of such satellites to support Ukraine was “provocative”.

With Ukraine’s counteroffensive in its southern Kherson region slowing down in recent days due to wet weather and difficult terrain, and no dramatic changes in the east either, Kyiv said Russia was pressing ahead with a campaign to destroy critical infrastructure ahead of the winter.

Ukrainian officials have said the campaign was aimed at breaking people’s spirit to resist by depriving them of basic utilities such as light and heat, a strategy they say is doomed to failure.

Russia says it is targeting infrastructure as part of what it calls its “special military operation” to degrade the Ukrainian military and remove what it says is a potential threat against its own security.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in a late night address to the nation on Wednesday, called on people to limit power use for the time being.

“In many cities and regions of Ukraine, emergency blackouts happen and power consumption has to be limited,” he said.

“But we all have to remember one thing: we need victory over Russia in the energy sphere as well.”